Not everything dangerous is bad. From the moment Angelina laid eyes on him, she fell into a fantasy. Mysterious, foreign, gorgeous, Haithem offered her what she needed most—a chance to feel again.

But Haithem is much more than he appears to be. He lives in a world of danger where everything comes at a price.

For Angelina, that price is her future. He's made sure the life she's left behind is in tatters. Made her family believe she's dead. Still, he talks about protecting her, about keeping her safe, but she can't distinguish his truth from his lies. She can't separate her pleasure from his betrayal.

Haithem warned her. He told her he'd make her heart race, her body come alive and her most primal needs rush to the surface. His for the taking.

He didn't say she'd come to love the devil who's destroying her, even as he keeps her prisoner.

“I swear—you never
existed. I never met you at all.”

His gaze flicked to
my touch, and stuck there as though the touching of him was not something that was usually done. His expression
shivered and whatever I thought I saw vanished. He rose to his feet. “I’m
afraid a promise made under duress is no promise at all.”

“What do you mean,
duress?” I leaped off the bed.

He strode for the
door. Apparently, he thought our conversation was over. Pity—I wasn’t done. I
followed him onto the deck.

Salty air swept
hair across my face.

“It’s not as if
you’ve threatened me, so I’m not under duress.”

He paused, pushed
the notepad into his pocket and turned. “You think someone has to hold a gun to
your head for you to be helpless?” His movements changed, went sharp yet
somehow also slinky. He walked—not to me but around me. “I have all the power,
all the say. And you—” he pointed his finger directly at me “—you, Angel, are a
scared girl who wants to go home.”

His words whipped
me like lashings from the wind. Painful, cutting lashes that made me want to
cry. He stalked me, closing his circle just as surely as a shark. My veins
spurted adrenaline, instinct compelling me to run.

But I didn’t run.
That would break the dubious politeness he’d affected, and this small glimpse
at what lay underneath was enough to shake the skin around me.

There was nowhere
to run. He’d catch me, and—god help me—I might even enjoy it.

I might enjoy
something so real and so raw as being caught, even if it hurt. No polite
control. Nothing proper or respectable. Just real.

He walked and
walked, round and around. My neck strained to keep up with him. I couldn’t drop
my gaze, couldn’t let him out of my peripheral vision.

“You owe me
nothing. I expect nothing from you. I trust no promises from you.” His voice
softened, whispered around me from what felt like all directions. He stopped
directly behind me, his hands coming down on my shoulders so I couldn’t turn.
“But this doesn’t have to be a nightmare. It doesn’t have to be a trap or a
prison.” He pulled me back against him, and suddenly his arms were around me
and the beast was gone, replaced instead by a comforting protector.

My pulse jumped.
How quickly he could change.

“This isn’t fair.
For that, I owe you, and I always honor my
debts.”

I’d slipped into
hyperawareness—of the arm around my waist, the body at my back, the voice in my
ear. I could almost see myself in his arms, standing like a waxwork, so still
and glassy-eyed. Mesmerized.

“I saw your face
when you told me you’re smothered so tightly you can’t breathe,” he whispered.
“You could be free…” He brushed his cheek against my temple. “No one around.
You could be yourself.”

He rocked me, so
softly I almost missed the shift of my weight from one side to the other. I no
longer knew if I was holding myself up.

“I can give you
sunsets on the ocean. I can show you space so endless you’ll lose yourself.”

My hair caught on
his bristles.

“Have you ever run
down a deserted beach, Angel?” His hand moved on my belly. “Have you ever swum
naked in salt water?” His voice penetrated my head, my blood, sinking down
somewhere even deeper.

“Imagine three weeks
where anything you ask will be indulged. All your demands met. Ask me for
something—ask me for anything.”

My eyes closed.

“Do you need
someone to hear you?” His word curled into my ear so gently, I felt the heat of
his body in his breath. “I’ll listen to you talk for days.”

He touched my
chest, pressed his palm flat against me.

I twitched.

“You can tell me
what it is you keep buried in here. What you’re holding on to so tightly that
you can’t let go. You can give it all to me, Angel. Just hand it all over to
me…”

Air flooded my
lungs, and I lunged out of his grasp. My heart beat so fast, I could imagine
coronary damage taking place. I turned and faced him, backing out of reach.

Had I let him read
me so thoroughly? Had I laid out my weakness so well that he could drive
himself into my head and fuck me there?

Because that’s what
he was doing—he was fucking my mind. I knew it. He knew it.

After spending years imagining fictional adventures, Amber Bardan finally found a way to turn daydreaming into a productive habit. She now spends her time in a coffee-fueled adrenaline haze, writing romance with a thriller edge.

She lives with her husband and children in semi-rural Australia, where if she peers outside at the right moment she might just see a kangaroo bounce by.

Amber is an award winning writer, Amazon Bestselling Author, and member of Romance Writers of Australia, Melbourne Romance Writers Guild, and Writers Victoria.